Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 81504 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 408(@200wpm)___ 326(@250wpm)___ 272(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81504 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 408(@200wpm)___ 326(@250wpm)___ 272(@300wpm)
“Behave yourself, or there’s more of that punishment to come.”
She bites her lips and nods.
“Why no blow job, Tully?”
Her lower lip sticks out like a child who just got told no cookies.
Bloody fucking perfect.
“You know why, McKenna.”
I want my baby in her again. There’ll be nothing between us when I make love to her.
I lead her over to the bookshelf.
“Pick a book. Make it a good one.”
She peruses the shelf while I look out the window.
Outside our window, the moon rises over the horizon, and the shades are drawn, save for one sliver of moonlight. There’s peace here in Ballyhock, and downstairs, the staff’s likely shutting the house up for the night. She shopped with the other women in town today, helping Maeve pick out some new clothes. She’s closer to Maeve since all that happened. The two are damn near inseparable.
“This one,” she says, holding a thick volume in hand. I can’t see the cover.
“What is it?” I frown, trying to read the title.
“Now, you let me worry about that. You worry about… other things.”
I give her arse a sharp smack. Jesus, I love her.
“Over the edge of the couch. Prop the book up. Read to me. I want to hear your that voice of yours when I take you.”
She shakes her head. “You have the oddest kinks, you know.”
“Don’t fucking care. Do what I say or I’ll slide a plug in that arsehole before I fuck you, and I’ll show you exactly how many kinks I have.”
She shakes her head and grins. “Oooh. Naughty.”
She kneels, drapes her body over the arm, and spreads her legs for me. I groan at the sight of her striped arse, and the musky, sweet scent of her arousal. Jesus God.
She’s thumbing through pages, as if she’s memorized this book, then she squeals as she finds it and sighs.
I line myself up at her entrance, stifling a groan at the hot, slick feel of her, as she begins to read, her clear, beautiful voice reciting as if she’s reading poetry.
“‘Come to me—come to me entirely now,’ said he, and added, in his deepest tone, speaking in my ear as his cheek was laid on mine…”
I hold her hips and thrust in her, and her voice wavers a bit as we unite.
“Make my happiness—I will make yours.”
My heart thumps, pounding in my chest at the magnitude of this moment, as close to McKenna as humanly possible, our enemies no longer after us.
She’s mine.
Mine.
I will absolutely make her happiness.
She reads on. “God, pardon me! He subjoined ere long; “and man meddle not with me: I have her, and will hold her.”
I have her, and I will hold her.
The words echo in my mind, as I make them my own, as I plunge myself fully in her and she moans in surrender.
I have her, and I will hold her.
Her words are choked, her voice wavering as she continues.
“You—you almost unearthly thing!—I love as my own flesh. You—”
Her voice trembles and she swallows, her tight grip on the book making her knuckles whiten. “I love this scene, Tully,” she whispers. “And I love you.”
I slow my thrusting, bend and kiss her shoulder, then embrace her fully from behind. “And I love you, McKenna. Read.”
“Poor and obscure, and small and plain as you are—I entreat to accept me as a husband.”
Is she crying? The book falls to the floor and she drops her head as my movements quicken and she welcomes me fully.
“I love you,” she pants, gripping the edge of the couch as we near ecstasy.
“I love you,” I echo, as my pulse quickens and she begins to moan.
We stop speaking, our bodies saying everything.
Heated skin, spasms of pleasure, I hold her to me as we chase our joy together.
* * *
We say our vows in the quiet of the garden, as so many men and women of the Clan before us have done. It’s a cool day, but she’s prepared, wearing a long-sleeved dress with these pretty little satin loops that attach to her fingers.
“Oh, she’s lovely,” Mary sighs, clasping her hands under her chin.
“A veritable beauty,” Caitlin says with a sigh.
We chose not to have a wedding party, since everyone we’d invite to be in our wedding party are the only people actually attending the wedding. Still, the girls are all dressed in pale green satin gowns. “Pistachio,” McKenna called it but whatever the fuck it is, it’s green. “Filmy and pretty, like they’re made of gossamer wings and fairy dust.” They could wear slinky little cocktail dresses for all I care, if it makes McKenna happy.
Because goddamn, if that isn’t the total focus of my attention, the center of my universe. Make her happy.
I stand with pride as she walks down the aisle on Keenan’s arm, my chest tight with feeling. She has no father to walk her down, and we haven’t seen her mother since the day she escaped. It’s just as well this way, and McKenna agrees. Still, she shed a few tears.